Together with two colleagues, Ruth Bonazza and Peter Thomas (Learning Enhancement Team, Middlesex University) we’ve discussed, questioned and explored the idea that #WritingSpaces are able to stimulate and support the making of ideas through writing.

#WritingSpaces are a physical translation of a mental space: writing, no matter if what we write is and essay or a to-do list, is a self reflective practice that help us to neaten thoughts.

“People dont’ have ideas, they make them”*

The research, undertaken by Ruth Bonazza, Francesca Murialdo and Peter Thomas (Middlesex University) consisted of 3 different phases; the first one, through an online questionnaire, was directed to gain quantitative and qualitative informations about writing practices (How much do you write? Which kind of text do you write? Where do you write? Which tools do you use?). The second step was developed through conversations in small groups (Focus Groups) to discuss and identify space qualities favourable to the writing process.

This last stage, based on the outcomes from the previous ones, transforms speculations into designed spatial proposals.

The brief put emphasis on some of the issues raised from the previous phases: collaboration, identity and ownership are key ideas that the students of Scuola del Design, together with a small group of students from the School of Design Ohio State University, explored with their diverse projects.

Permeability, a given set of locations and contexts (public building/retail environment, library/bookshop, classroom, leftovers – corridors, footways,..) and writing formats have shaped the projects.

The ideas presented on Friday, after an intense week of work, are rooted in an accurate investigation about writing behaviours and practices that initiated the discussion.

Both Waves and Writer’s Destination choose airports as the ideal location to set up two very different projects. Waves (Mara Faravelli, Samantha Nemeth, Francesca Scorza, Tanya Soriato, Alice Tinelli, Amanda Viell) works on the concept of proximity and isolation, creating site generic space-furniture able to populate different contexts; Writer’s Destination (Giulia Bazzani, Hacer Beril Beden, Camilla Berruti, Chiara Bianco, Achille Erin, Katie Riley) focuses on the degree of customisation that such a popular space needs in order to meet different needs.

Libraries and bookshops have been identified by the research as an inspirational place where the presence of books trigger osmotically further words. Comic Nook (Anthony Josuè Favitta, Giulia Ferrara, Alex Getz, Jonathan Lambert, Silvia Rossi) introduces the comic novel as a very specific writing product able to merge words with graphics; exploiting and occupying the spaces between libraries, Comic Nook provides a futuristic pod able to gather around you needed references (it includes a service design feature that connects with the library catalogue) and other innovative tools. Starting from different premises Still Frame (Francesca Notaro, Costanza Diletta Lucia Previti, Fanny, Alyssa Miller, Catherine Renault, Laura Peshek) is an elegant system that is connected and generated from bookshelves: the thin steel frames are counterbalanced by coloured rubber surfaces to sit or write in two different settings, a more informal email-mode and a more structured longer tasks writing mode.

Origami (Claudia Casciaro, Andrea Cola, Francesco Di Girolamo, Giuseppe Francesco Giurfa, Emily Khouri, Ximeng Huang) aims to transform ideas in a university context: the structure unfolds and remodels ordinary classrooms generating a sequence of spaces able to provoke and enhance the exchange of ideas. The same context, a university classroom, has been explored also by Muro della Creativita‘ (Bianca Adams, Emily Datsko, Marta De Marie, Chloè Denniston, Matteo Delledonne, Didem Parlas) that, with an architectural approach, provides a space within a space: every detail questions how space supports creativity and writing.

The last two projects confronts leftover spaces in two very different ways. Slide & Study (Brianna Branko, Delia Ferraris, Vladislav Kotov, Elizabeth Riddel, Davide Maurice Weissy, Valeria Zucco) is able to activate corridors in an educational context providing a customizable temporary provision of desks and seats that the user can arrange in different arrangements according to needs. Brain Train (Coralita Juliana Arnold, Fabrizio Carbotti, Maria Beatrice Finotto, Mattia Marzorati, Mandy Pavlich) is situated in train stations and, by exploring different writing tools, provides a surface to write: contributions are stored and displayed as layered memories on the collaborative ‘monument’, exploring writing as a social activity.

Also this year we’ve been invited by professor Beltran Berrocal to collaborare to the course Design.it for VIA summer course @ Scuola del Design – Politecnico di Milano.

12 students from Denmark worked on different system in interiors that TRANSFORMS or IS TRANSFERABLE from one function to another.
We investigated the retail topic through our traditional milanese Retail Tour and Francesca Murialdo’s lecture about Practice of Consumption and Spaces for Goods.

The Xth edition of the Maser in Exhibition Design by IDEA, Associazione Italiana Exhibition Designers and Poli.Design host IDEAstore|#magaziniricordati 2.0.

After last semester’s success of #memorystore we’ve been set a different brief for the master designers. The idea is to insert scheduling as a strategic part of the design process. Intervention for such a big heritage, both in terms of meaning and scale, need an accurate study in terms of feasibility and sustainability.

Three main topics has been set (food, sport, utility) and a five years timeframe in which the designers had to place the three different stages of the design, the idea store, the pilot and the consolidation phase.

For the #food topic we present pepito (Beniamino Roy Naim, Federica Radice, Giulia Nelli) and doeat (Ilaria Iannelli, Dariia Maksimova, Veronica Valentini). Pepito is a library and a spice shop that becomes spice shop and cooking lab and a restaurant in its consolidation phase.

Pepito|layout poster for the spice shop (pilot phase)

doeat focusses on the handmade food, on the tradition , on the quality of the ingredients and on the cooking process designing three stages hosting markets, labs and shops with different function percentage in each one.

Doeat|layout of the food market with details of the tablecloth floor decoration

#sport topic has been centred on bicycle and rollerskating. Bruno (Gaia Brambilla, Anna Chiara Mauri, Federica Muollo, Costanza Però), that borrow the name from the kid of Ladri Di Biciclette, design an accessorised bicycle parking, a special mechanic workshop and a cycling bar.

Bruno|drive through bycicle workshop

Roll-in (Lorena Aybar, Vittoria Tagini, Clementina Grandi) starts from a skate-rink, develops into a skate school to end into a skate shop.

Roll-in|the skater’s shop

The #utility topic works on two different projects, one dedicated to kids and the other one on reading and writing. Beok design three different spaces starting with the main one that is a library for emerging writers; pilot phase is a full publishing service to develop into a creative writing school.

Beok|view of the library devoted to emerging writers

NouNou|elevation of the clothing shop

Nou Nou‘s idea store is an indoor playground, a game swap shop and a clothing shop.

Strategy, timing and a collaborative idea of the design process able to involve the local community to tests ideas in order to develop them into real necessities.

Last thursday at Urban Center we participate in the debate “200 milioni per le periferie?”, part of series of meetings called Periferia InConTra, event sponsored by Consulta delle Periferie Milanesi.

During the meeting we discussed thenew plan for the regeneration and redevelopment of the suburbs and urban areas with which the Italian Government has earmarked an investment of 200 million euro and figures that by September 30, 2015 the Municipalities present projects to be started soon on regeneration of peripheral areas, improvement of urban spaces, reuse and regeneration of the buildings.

During the debate, Mario Abruzzese and one of the students, Marco Paris, shared with those present the results of the intense experience of Memory Store, which we have been working on over the past six months exploring places, collecting memories, rethinking the spaces in and around the Magazzini Raccordati.

The Final Cut, the conclusion of the this year labowork’s interior design studio has been very successful and fun: the green area between Viale Brianza and via Ferrante Aporti was populated by people, friends and guests that came to see the #memorystore projects for the magazzini raccordati (connected warehouses).

The students have set up an open-air exhibition presenting ideas and projects for the re-use of the forsaken warehouses and the rail tunnels at street level. An indoor park that use as connective system for all other activities inside #magazziniricordati: spaces for sport, sharing’ kitchens for the neighborhood, spaces for social interaction, work or reading, hydroponic cultivations and food shooping places.

A great opportunity for discussion and collaboration that has seen working together teachers, students, associations, the local institutions and residents in the belief that the work done can be a model for many other future experiences.